Hull performance monitoring

With the launch of HEMPASIL X3 in 2008, HEMPEL claimed to be the first paint supplier to offer a total package composed of –

1) An efficient fouling release system.

2) A hull performance monitoring system.

3) A fuel consumption guarantee.

“It is our experience over the last five years that operators find it more and more relevant to be able to measure hull performance applying a transparent standardised methodology. We also believe this is the only objective way to determine fuel saving claims of the eco-efficient coating technologies on the market today,” said Torben Rasmussen, Hempel’s group product manager.

A Hempel coated tanker seen about to leave drydock.

Hempel said that the company believed that the right approach was to let an independent third party company do the measuring. “We should not as a paint company be the party that defines methodology and parameters to be measured,” Rasmussen stressed.

The company therefore supports Clean Shipping Coalition’s initiative to bring these issues forward at the IMO in order to get a reliable and transparent standard for measuring hull and propeller performance.

“Today there is a number of companies offering hull performance programmes. But if the tanker operators fully should utilise the fuel efficiency potential of today’s advanced hull coatings, we really need a credible standardised way of measuring hull performance,” continued Rasmussen.

Hempel’s performance monitoring system SeaTrend is undertaken in collaboration with Force Technology in Denmark, the company explained.